Disney Eliminates its Metaverse Division as Virtual Worlds Pass their Prime

According to a recent Wall Street Journal article, Disney has terminated all 50 employees working for its metaverse subsidiary. While the majority of people are still unsure of what the “metaverse” actually is, it has been reported that Disney has abandoned its ambitions to investigate it as the business begins to lay off nearly 7,000 workers nationwide.

Mike White, who oversaw Disney’s metaverse team, will continue to work for the organization, according to the Wall Street Journal. A request for comment made late on Monday went unanswered by Disney.

In February 2022, Disney established its metaverse business, which former CEO Bob Chapek named “next generation storytelling” because it seemed Facebook must be onto something. In October 2021, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg unveiled a daring new strategy to concentrate on the metaverse. To further underline his devotion to this vision, he even renamed his firm Meta.

Nevertheless, to many in the computer industry, the metaverse is now little more than a joke—an attempt to create a virtual world where the main “innovation” was being able to see your coworkers using silly avatars. In February, Zuckerberg announced a change of direction for his company, saying it would concentrate on artificial intelligence. Although chatbots like ChatGPT and picture makers like Midjourney fall under the umbrella of AI, there is general agreement that these technologies will be revolutionary.

The Reddit page for Midjourney demonstrates how thrilling and maybe dangerous the coming years with AI will be. People have already been duped by a false Pope Francis wearing a large white puffer coat, a 2001 earthquake that never occurred, and the arrest of the former president Donald Trump. Even more recently, Trump posted a phony photo of himself praying on Truth Social.

History is filled with forecasts that virtual reality worlds would revolutionize society, particularly during the 1990s VR hype cycle. Jaron Lanier, a technologist and media critic, predicted in 1991 that virtual worlds would transcend physical space. In 1993, AT&T also produced a concept movie that envisioned children of the future engaging in virtual reality gaming. Even NBC News produced a segment in 1996 cautioning that the technology might make people sick.

Yet that image of the future never materialized, partly due to how enormous and pricey current virtual reality headsets are. Nobody can forecast the future with any degree of certainty, and it is unclear if AI will be commercialized in novel and exciting ways. Yet if you must choose between metaverse and AI, you should probably go with the latter. Disney undoubtedly is.